


Penny for Your Thought

by Control_Room, Random_ag



Series: The W-lly Franks Twins [37]
Category: Bendy and the Ink Machine
Genre: ???????? Possibly???????????, Awkward Conversations, Awkwardness, Dont Worry It All Goes Good In The End, Embarrassment, Funny, How The Hell Did Any Of These People Ever Get Laid, Kim apparently gets Too Lost In The Sauce to offer Advice, M/M, Somebody help jo, Suggestive Themes, What the Fuck Is Wrong With The People In These Goddamned Studios, trying to ask someone out, trying to ask someone to bed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-15
Updated: 2020-11-15
Packaged: 2021-03-10 02:41:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27576646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Control_Room/pseuds/Control_Room, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Random_ag/pseuds/Random_ag
Summary: Joey needs advice. Unfortunately no one around seems to be able to give any. Nothing good, at least, Kim learns.
Relationships: Joey Drew/Henry Stein, Others mentioned
Series: The W-lly Franks Twins [37]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1016235
Comments: 6
Kudos: 3





	Penny for Your Thought

Kim was used to Shawn being loud and obnoxious to the point of driving even those who loved him to bits and pieces to consider performing most heinous acts of unspeakable violence upon him that would make him literal bits and pieces (see: Kim Grosso, Willy Franks, Henry Stein, Niamh O’Flannel). It made him wonder why Johan-- who was quiet and polite, much like himself-- managed to get along so well with the Irishman. At first glance such an affinity could have been attributed to their taste in lovely flirtatious men, but nobody in the studios was superficial enough to consider such a thing. Especially because Willy was anything but a flirt. Another could be their shared history, after all, one could not be in the mafia underground without encountering a Flynn and a Drew. Often together. Usually not fighting. However, both parties had left their pasts behind, so that was unlikely too. However, it probably just was the fact that Joey could get along with anyone, as long as they wanted to.

Kim spotted the two conversing quietly, and though it vexed him that he could not hear their words, he made due by watching the flow of Joey’s expressions. The man was as entertaining a host as he was to simply watch from afar. Kim found it a quite agreeable pastime as he stitched, keeping track of the little changes in Joey's expressions and ticks, the man’s ears particularly amusing to behold as they twitched side to side and back in a blush. Shawn made some subtle gestures as he spoke, for once in a low tone, Johan shifting slightly. The Irishman shrugged, smiled, patted the taller man’s shoulder, and then left the toy department, probably going on break.

Kim felt curiosity chew obsessively at his liver, aching to know just what on Earth had transpired during the conversation between the two men. To his surprise, Johan actually started walking towards him, flushed in the face (the red especially coloring his cheeks) and timid in his step, as if he had embarrassing matters to discuss with him. The head of the studio waved shyly at him, as though asking if he were available to talk. Kim quickly left his unfinished work on his desk and nodded feverishly.

“May I help you?” he asked immediately before the Chicano could even open his mouth. Joey’s blush only deepened and he looked to his shoes, mumbling something about how the (a word sounding like majority) of the people here gave (an adjective Kim could not decipher) advice. The shorter man tilted his head a little, confused. “Could you repeat that last bit? What kind of advice?”

“Completely and utterly moronic,” Johan managed to clarify. “Would you underst-stand what someone was trying to tell you if they played saxophone f-for three hours in your vicinity?”

“Unless I sat too close to them at a gig or concert, I'd understand that they want me to get out.”

“Well, I _told_ Sammy that advice was total nonsense, but he _insisted_ that it would work,” Joey groaned, slumping down onto an oversized Alice and covering his face. “I have absolutely n-no idea how to broach this s-subject, not with him, not with anyone.”

“What subject are we talking about, here?” Kim inquired, dark eyes turned to slithers. Johan grew several shades darker. Which, actually, was a considerable feat when you took in the man’s purple and gold undertones.

“Ah, uhm…” he mumbled, playing with the large doll’s hand, gripping it hard, as though to steady himself. He was pressing his back against it seemingly to merge himself into the fluffy innards of the giant doll, slightly squirming and more than a little embarrassed. “I, I was trying t-to, to, ah… well, do you… not r-really you, uh, how does one… I mean--”

“Take your time.”

“How… how does one tell s-somebody that they, um… that they w-want them in their bed?” Kim had to lean closer and closer to the man as he spoke, being that his volume decreased exponentially, and when he heard the last fragment, he first froze solid for a minute or so before coming back to reality and jolting backwards, electrified by his words. Joey’s fluster grew even more from his reaction, and he turned away to hide his shame and bury himself within the doll, seemingly hellbent on strangling himself on cotton stuffing, slightly screaming.

Kim blinked one or two times to properly digest what had just been relayed to him. He faced Johan once again - as best as he could while the man was voluntarily glitching himself into being assimilated by cotton and fabric.

“Do you think I know?” he genuinely asked. Jo sunk a little further into the doll, a red eye glancing at Kim and then head shaking, pressing himself harder. “What- how- what? What?”

A muffled voice managed to emit: “I know you've had so-some partners before, s-so maybe--”

“Sir, I don't know _how_ or _why_ that happens! I know I get _into_ the bed and--” a hand covered his face, Johan somehow accurately predicting where his mouth was from behind his back.

“Before you say somethin’ that I know you’ll regret, I just wanna know, w-well, how to _approach_ the subject, not how it plays out.”

“Sir,” Kim repeated, “I don't _know._ I don't think I have ever come into a fifteen mile radius of the subject at any given moment of my entire life. As far as I'm concerned, no matter how lucid I may be, I will be first somewhere, maybe kissing, maybe watching something, and then there's the bed.”

“And in discussion?” Joey asked, looking at him with slight concern. “Are you certain, um, that it was, well, consensual? If you’re h-having any problems with someone--”

“Do _not_ worry about that, I’m completely sure everything is alright. It seems I just get so into the part right before the bed that my brain completely shuts everything else down.”

Kim wondered if the plushie was starting to smoke or if that was just yet another one of Johan’s strange properties coming to light.

“Are you alright?” he asked.

Johan gave a garbled noise sounding a bit like a sonar ping.

“Is that a yes?”

Another of a similar noise, which Kim realized could possibly mean yes or no.

“I'm gonna need more context.”

“Your advice is j-just as terrible as everyone elses'.” 

“It was not advice! I have no advice to give!”

“An’ that’s why it’s terrible.”

“What in the name of any and all gods did everybody else tell you to be as terrible as no advice?!”

“Are you really interested in such a thing?” Joey inquired, grumpy. He seemed to have been going at this all day, Shawn and Kim being last resorts.

Kim stopped for a second, time freezing still in his mind. On one hand, no. Absolutely not. If Sammy had suggested three hours of saxophone to set the mood, he did not imagine what other idiocies might have been suggested. Also, he knew for a fact that Shawn’s method of seduction was laying sideways on a bed in his birthday suit. He did not need to know that.

On the other, he was morbidly curious.

“I absolutely need you to tell me.”

Johan groaned and sunk back into the giant Alice.

“Who’s… _wonderful_ advice would you like f-first?”

“I don't know. Not Shawn’s. I know it already. Uh… Johnny, sure, why not.”

“Challenge them to a duel. Or f-fight someone in their presence.”

“Huh. Like deer?”

“I suppose.” 

“Sounds like something Niamh would do. If she wasn't asexual.”

“Actually, after a slight misunderstanding where she told me to just invite them o-over for a s-slumber party, her advice was ‘hurl them into a tree at mach speeds’.” Joey groaned and rubbed his cheek. “Not exactly sure how well that would f-fly.”

“Pretty well, I think. In a literal sense.”

Johan glared at him.

“I’d break my back, Kim.” Joey remarked. “I’m not a strong man.”

“Understandable. Please go on, you said Sammy’s, what about Jack’s?”

“Slowly remove articles of clothing (from myself or otherwise) while glancing at them,” Joey managed to reply, curling into the plushie. “Nice in theory, cheesy in romance novellas, absolutely _awful_ to actually do.”

“Because it takes time?”

“Because I can’t exactly do that in the art room.”

“ _What_ the hell.”

“Yes. If it wasn’t obvious, he meant it publicly. M-Many here have either too much confidence or no shame whatsoever.”

Kim remained in stunned silence for a while, pondering how exactly any of these people (Niamh excluded, of course) had ever actually gotten laid, possibly without getting arrested for public display of obscene acts on their way to seducing.

“And yes, these people, well, let’s just say,” Joey’s ears tilted back. “Have experience. Unlike myself. Uh. Forget I said that.”

“I am… surprised… and most of all concerned, that any of these methods actually worked.”

“Willy’s advice was to make a trail of various romantic flowers. Which, I suppose, would work on Shawn rather well.”

“I guess so, yes. Who else… Susie? Allison? Did they have better ideas?”

“Allison said to write it in alphabet soup,” Johan ticked off candidly. “Susie’s was to sit on their w-workstation in a pinup pose.”

“Lacie?”

“Go hold them from behind and basically let yourself l-loose with dirty talk.” Johan covered his face again in fluster. “And I’m sure you can guess how g-good I’d be at that.”

“Ah. I… won't ask about Mr. Piedmont. He probably just said no.”

“Well, to your surprise, he had some advice that was better than most,” Johan shrugged. “Run away and hide in a cave. I think it might have been the b-best advice yet.”

That sounded about right.

“I'm a little scared of what Wally and Thomas might have gone for.”

“Thomas said that he flexed until they asked him,” Joey responded. “Wally shrugged and told me I was on my own. What he does is just take them to his room at any time but bedtime and they get the point. According to him. Which seems correct judging by Tom and Sammy’s a-advice. Those three appear to b-be awfully good at reading each other.”

Again, based on previous, absolutely bonkers information, that seemed right.

“Well, uh, Norman? Grant?”

“Norman replied that Eros always just knew,” Joey blushed even more. “Grant turned away with a b-blank expression and got out his siddur, telling me ‘good luck’.”

“Who's left then, Ms. Lambert?”

“Abby told me to slap then kiss them, consensually,” Joey seemed to run out of places to hide his face and so tucked his knees up. “Which is _not_ my style. No judgement, but absolutely n-not. Emma said to be slapped and kissed consensually.”

“Match made in heaven.”

“I’d assume Hell.”

“You did _not_ consult Eska, I am sure of that.”

Johan's mind-eye reproduced for a second the image of the masked factotum crawling on the ceiling like a horrendously shaped reptile, nails sinking in the wood, and for the second time it decided not approaching would have been the best option.

“No. He’d defenestrate me. Are you mad?” 

“Knew it. So that leaves…”

“Shawn and you.” Joey sighed. “Shawn’s reply was t-to ask them to screw me while we ate breakfast-- not. As we eat but-- asking the question then and then giving them the heimlich if necessary. And you gave me nothing.”

“And Mr. Stein.”

Johan’s smile was a mite crazed. 

“Do you think I can ask the guy I want _how I should ask him?!”_

Kim stared at him straight in the pupils: “Yes.”

“He’d laugh!”

“And then?”

“And then what? I’d die of embarrassment! If this whole day hasn’t killed me of it y-yet, that would!”

“And then he would hurl you in the bed.”

Johan’s breath hitched, cheeks flushing.

“B-but I wanna,” he twiddled with his fingers as he mumbled, curling in slightly. “Be suave, a-and smooth, and… not a fool. I want to be able to, I don’t know, take his hands and tell him how I feel about him, and I wanna k-kiss him soft and let him know that he’s the only person I want to be with, and the be confident and look him in the eye and t-tell him that I’m ready.”

Kim nodded slightly, chin in his hand, thinking.

“I think I know a guy with good advice, actually.” he proposed. Johan's ears perked up hopefully: “Really? W-who's that?”

“Mr. Ramirez, from the office.”

“Wh-what? But… uh, Kim, _I’m_ Ramirez.”

“Exactly.”

Johan looked at him stupefied. He wallowed on his own words for a second, trying to understand what the hell was going on. Then his eyes brightened slowly, mouth a tad ajar. 

“Oh. _Oh_ , goodness.”

Kim looked intently at him, waiting for something. Eventually he just opened his arms with impatience and incited: “The hell are you doing here still?”

“What?” Johan looked at him in a daze.

“I thought you had a man to romance?”

“Oh, oh, right,” Johan got up in one smooth motion. “Right, right, right, I’ll see you l-later, Kim.”

As he watched him leave, part of Kim wanted to see how it would pan out the next day, to judge by Joey and Henry how well it had gone. But a louder part of him wanted to see how it would go _right then_. 

He slithered away from his desk and climbed the stairs five steps at a time to match Joey’s long gait, though he made sure the man was ahead of him and unaware of him following. He watched as Johan knocked demurely on the art department door, and requested for Henry. The two walked a bit down the hall and into an empty office, and Kim snuck into the one beside, hoping it to be one of Lacie’s peeking rooms, which it was, to his delight. He could clearly see the couple through two peepholes.

“Henry, you know I love you,” Joey began softly, taking the doctor’s hands into his own. “An’ I know you love m-me.”

“I do, with my whole heart,” Henry smiled at him. “And? What of our love?”

“You’re the only one I want,” Johan managed to tell him, eyes honest and bright. Henry stared at him, a bigger smile twitching at his lips. “And I want you to be with me whenever, however, all the time. I love you so m-much, Henry.”

Henry was silent, patiently waiting for Joey to continue. Joey sighed, closed his eyelids, pressed his forehead to Henry’s and opened his eyes.

“I’m ready,” he whispered. “If you’d like to have me-- all of me-- I’m ready.”

“Johan Icarus,” Henry murmured, and kissed him softly. Kim thought he might squeal, and covered his mouth. “I’d love to. But you know this is a two way thing. All of me is yours, Joey.”

Johan, overcome with emotion, kissed his hand, his lips, and they slipped away.

Kim nearly became an explosion.


End file.
